Friday

Gen X; Bridging the Gap

Being part of Generation X, I often feel like a bridge between two different dimensions. (Boomers & Millennials.) Gen Xer’s possess traits of both Baby Boomers and Gen Y.

We are a small group sandwiched between two huge and socially impactful groups. We are often the Baby Boomers kids and we are in many cases the parents of Gen Y. We are in our late 20’s to early 40’s and make up about 30% of the workforce. Being a bridge between these two groups is greatly beneficial to me as a recruiter because I relate comfortably with both the Boomer and the Millennial candidates. I can also connect the two groups as well.

I have become a “go to” person for instructions to find things on the internet, attach documents to email and reading things with small printing often for Boomers professionally and personally.

Boomers have a comfort level to ask me internet related questions without feeling out of touch. Asking “What is an avatar?” is not a silly question. It is valid to me but probably not to a millennial. To them it is obvious because I believe they were born with one assigned to them. Gen Y’s look at me as old enough to have a clue but more for validation or praise but definitely not about the technology.

Gen Y’ers (AKA Millennials) live in the 2.0 world. They don’t know life without cel phone, personal computers, the internet and information at your fingertips for all.

Baby Boomers have computer and do use them effectively but can live without them because they had a life before them.

Boomers can type well because they were required to take classes in high school to learn. Gen Y can type, but with whatever method they choose and holy cow can they text! Boomers can text but many are like my mom, taking 30 minutes to write “Thanks.” (10 minutes to find her glasses, 10 minutes to figure out how to get to the messaging feature on her phone and 10 more to actually type the response.) I have watched her do this process and although she is proud of her accomplishment, it is exhausting to watch. It is just as tiring as watching a Gen Yer maintain 5 different text conversations while eating lunch, browsing MySpace and driving their environmentally friendly car. I can text but prefer email or phone because I want the details. (Gen X trait)

As I stated in my previous post, Gen X are the next leaders of the free world. From this post I realize that we have also become the bridge in the generation gap. I guess from my clearly biased, amusing and condescending accurate view, Gen X, holds it altogether.